Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Crazy Co-Workers

A good friend that I work with, and ride with occasionally, had a serious crash Sunday afternoon. He has a broken left ankle, both jaws are broke and has damaged some disc's in his neck (best description I could get at work last night). I haven't talked to him, right ... like he is going to talk with both jaws broken, ok I haven't talked to his wife yet to find out what is going on with him. Dan is a good, happy go lucky, guy that always has a smile on his face and knows no stranger.

I am feeling a little bit better, have made it pretty good at work the last two nights. We had a paper break last night so I had a lot of stair climbing to do, threading paper back through five of the six ovens on the press. I am even feeling good while pushing the rolls of paper to load them into the press. The average weight on the rolls of paper we run is 3400 pounds. Last night about midway through the shift, a co-worker suddenly contracted a case of mischievousness and got the foam hand cleaner out. She had two handful's of foam and came after me. She caught me off guard, but missed and wasn't expecting me to salvage what I had on my shirt and come running after her. We were chasing each other like kids around the playground and everyone in the press room stopped and were watching us laughing with us. I am 51 and she is 46 ... she was laughing and giggling so hard she couldn't do anything except stand still and giggle as I got her back ... except I didn't miss like she did. For a brief moment, I forgot all about pain, responsibility, everything ... I was a kid again and it was a great feeling.

About Me

I live with a chronic disease (RA) but still ride all that I can. Riding is my therapy. RA is a strange disease to live with, one day it is all I can do to get out of bed and walk to the living room, the next day I may go ride 150 miles. I do not live or ride pain free but will not give up on enjoying life. I have been reduced to adventure riding, the least strenuous type of off road riding. RA limits my mileage to 150-200 miles a day. I currently own a 2013 KLR650 which I ride every chance I get.